Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Part II: Bear Referendum - Ch. 29: November Media Coverage

Part II - Bear ReferendumChapter 29 - November Media Coverage

Petition booth axed after threats to mall

1996-11-04The Trail Timesby Lana Rodlie

… The problem stemmed from a visit to Trail several weeks ago by Anthony Marr… Although Marr said he was scorned, yelled at, intimidated, threatened and slandered in other parts of the province, no one thought such tactics would be used here.

Unfortunately, for John and Rachel Kratky, intimidation raised its ugly head after Marr left.

The Kratkys volunteered to help Marr’s cause by locally obtaining signatures. They approached Waneta Plaza and asked if they could set up a table in the mall.

The mall manager saw no problem and said it was alright. However, the decision was quickly reversed.

“We were told that we couldn’t set up because the mall had received a bunch of phone calls from people threatening to picket,” said Rachel Kratky… Waneta Plaza manager Linda MacDermid confirms… MacDermid said this is the first time anyone has ever called with threats over a proposed petition campaign or anything else.

“We’ve always had all sorts of groups with petitions. Even when we had Pro-Choice people, we’ve never had any calls. Yet…”…

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Bear hunt opponents bring the campaign here

1996-11-12The Citizen, Prince George, BC by Gordon Hoekstra

The WCWC is sending a swat team to Prince George in a last ditch effort… Expected to arrive this Friday for a three-day stay, the team is to roll into town with a caravan of two or three vehicles – at least one of them highly decorated with banners – and set up shop, said bear protection campaign manager Anthony Marr from Vancouver… This summer, prior to the launch of the 90-day petition campaign, Marr received a less than warm reception from hunters at an information session here.

Marr said he expects it will get even hotter this time. “We’re in the home stretch, and we’re fighting.”…

The WCWC would be better off directing its attention to curtailing the Asian market that deal in bear parts, says groups like the BC Wildlife Federation…

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Malls turn away bear hunt opponents

1996-11-13The Citizen, Prince George, BC by Gordon Hoekstra

Unable to get permission to set up their ban-bear-hunting petition drive at any of the malls here, a Lower Mainland preservation group will try to gather signatures near the Civic Centre starting Friday.

In general, the malls told him that they didn’t want to alienate anyone, Anthony Marr said Tuesday… Marr believes many more people would have become bear petition canvassers in rural areas, but they’ve been intimidated by a strong counter-action to the ban-bear-hunting campaign, especially in the Central Interior…

But he added, “We’ve got a job to do, and we’re giving it our best shot.”…

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Bear-hunt ban sought

1996-11-13The Globe and Mail (national)

The WCWC is sending a team of environmentalists to Prince George in a last ditch effort to gather signatures to ban bear hunting in BC. The group will set up near polling stations during the civic elections on Saturday, said campaign direct Anthony Marr… Only 20,000 signatures have been turned in to the Committee to date.

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City won’t block bear banners from polling stations

1996-11-14The Free Press, Prince George, BC by David Plug

… A mobile campaign by the WCWC sets up shop in downtown Prince George tonight, and organizer Anthony Marr says local polling stations will be key sites for their petition for a referendum on bear hunting.

While municipal campaigners won’t be allowed within 100 meters of the polls, no such restriction applies to the WCWC canvassers.

“… There’s nothing in the Municipal Act that prohibits it as long as they’re not interfering with the election process or campaigning for a candidate,” says Joni Heinrich, Prince George’s deputy city clerk.

Of some concern is how heated encounters between canvassers and hunters will become… When asked if he expected some sort of fireworks when canvassers and hunters meet face-to-face, Marr replied, “No doubt, but we are willing to deal with it when it happens. We would like people to know that this is a totally legal process and totally democratic. We are playing by the book and hope the opponents do the same.”…

Their mobile campaign will travel to the Peace River region next week and could return here again on their way to Prince Rupert… (Marr) has arranged radio interviews for tomorrow morning on CBC-AM and CIRX/CJCI but not with CKPG’s Ben Meisner. “I’ve had two encounters with him and neither one was enjoyable,” said Marr…

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Bear Care on election day – first citizen initiative

1996-11-14Island Tides, Victoria, BC by Serena van Bakel

… Paul George, Founding Director of WCWC, is the first person (by law, a proponents must be a person, not an organization) to seriously attempt to use BC’s new Recall and Initiative Act to bring forward citizen-generated legislation…

However, BC law bans canvassing within 100 meters of any polling station…

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Bear activists piggyback on polls

1996-11-15Victoria New, Weekend Edition by Brian Dryden

… To hit the target in the Capital Region, (WCWC’s Victoria campaign coordinator Liora Freedman says the blitz of municipal election polling stations will involve more than 80 canvassers who are registered to collect signatures.

John Marshall, deputy chief electoral officer for Victoria’s municipal election, says…, “As long as they are not connected to any candidates then they can do that…”…

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Bear ‘ban-wagon’ gets cool reception

1996-11-16The Citizen, Prince George, BC by Gordon Hoekstra

… Battling the wind and -10C temperatures, WCWC canvassers from Vancouver set up tables Friday at the intersection of Victoria Street and Seventh Avenue to gather signatures… Hunter Brad Davis stopped to protest the bear skin propped on top of the 24-foot, banner-decorated motor home, which he thought was in bad taste…

“It takes a lot of guts to be out here, and they need all the support they can get,” said Chris Leischner, an avowed environmentalist who signs the petition…

The 11-person caravan came to the North because the petition has struggled here…

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Bear canvassers will go ahead

1996-11-16Times Colonist, Victoria, BC by Malcolm Curtis

… Victoria’s chief electoral officer John Marshall said this week that the bear referendum advocates cannot collect signatures within 100 meters of any polling station… Municipal Affairs spokeswoman Karin Harris said it will be up to electoral officers to interpret provincial legislation that regulates permitted activity outside polling stations.

But Greg McDade, lawyer for the Sierra Legal Defence Fund, said there is nothing wrong with people collecting signatures for a petition outside a polling place.

The Municipal Act prevents people from soliciting votes or other activities designed to influence a municipal election (wearing signs, carrying flags or leafleting) with 100 meters of a polling station.

Terry Kirk, chief electoral officers for Saanich, said his municipality will not be preventing bear referendum supporters from gathering signatures…

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Hunting foes target voters in bid to force referendum

1996-11-16Times Colonist, Victoria, BC by Malcolm Curtis

Organizers of the Ban Bear Hunting Initiative say they will have canvassers outside 53 of 57 polling stations in Greater Victoria on voting day, in a bid to gather more than 20,000 signatures.

“We are quite shy of our goal,” says Liora Freedman of WCWC… As of Tuesday, the group said it had collected fewer than 3,000 signatures from the 7 provincial ridings around Victoria.

“That’s misleading,” said Freedman, noting that many canvassers have collected more signatures, but have not yet mailed them in…

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Act needs revision to deal with referendum problems

1996-11-17The Free Press, Prince George, BC by David Plug

…supporters of a ban on bear hunting were allowed to (collect signatures) outside polling stations in some cities and not others…

“There’s nothing that prohibits them from being there. The petition has standing under the Recall and Initiative Act…,” says city clerk Allan Chabot. “As long as their campaign doesn’t take on local flavour or begins to implicate one candidate or another, and it remains peaceful, we don’t have the authority to do anything.”

In Vancouver, they took a different track and told canvassers to stay away from polling stations…

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Physician takes up cause of wild bears in valley

1996-11-19Alberni Valley Times, Port Alberni, BC by Diane Morrison

Mike Barrett would rather see Black bears used as a natural resource to attract tourists than to see them used as an attraction for hunters to kill… Dr. Barrett is one of the volunteers collecting signatures…

“Eco-tourism, and soft adventure tourism, is the biggest growth area in the economy on the West Coast…,” he said…

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Bear-hunt foe threatens to sue

1996-11-20The Vancouver Sun Canadian Press

Prince George - … Barney Kern of the WCWC was collecting signatures in the Civic Centre on Saturday while voting took place.

He said he was ordered to leave by chief electoral officer Allan Chabot and city manager George Paul. “We do not need permission to collect signatures in a public place,” said Kern…

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Bear hunting protestors cry foul

1996-11-20The Mirror, Sooke, BC by Mitch Moore

… Kerry Fedosenko, the returning officer at the Saseenos school polling station, said she was instructed by the chief electoral officer Thomas Moore to ask a lone canvasser to move from the school… The canvasser, Jefferson Bray, complied.

Later, however, Bray and two other supporters moved back closer to the entrance and Moore contacted the Sooke RCMP.

Bray said he reluctantly complied until he was told by other ‘Bear Day’ volunteers that Fedosenko had no authority to ask him to move.

“I was told that I was well within my rights to be there. I wasn’t blocking people’s access and I was not representing any of the candidates… He refused to move when asked by RCMP officers. They eventually let him stay…

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Bear campaign confrontation

1996-11-21The Tribune, Williams Lake, BC by Jonathan Desbarats

A group campaigning to ban bear hunting in BC was turfed out of Boltanio Mall yesterday after a confrontation with the president of the Williams Lake Sportsman’s Association…

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Bear Care-A-Van parked for petition

1996-11-21The Daily News, Kamloops, BC

… while (Anthony Marr) was in Prince George, one man threatened to punch him in the face and another deliberately bumped his shoulder while walking past… hard enough to spin Marr around.

But in two days, 1,700 signatures were gathered in Prince George…

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Hunting protest in homestretch

1996-11-22Kamloops This Week by Jennifer Muir

WCWC volunteers Barney Kern and Jon French do their best to stay warm while collecting signatures on the ban the bear hunt petition at the corner of Third and Victoria Thursday… WCWC spokesman Anthony Marr says at present the organization has up to 40,000 signatures, while others are in the mail…

… Ma Seeu-Sang and his volunteers gathered several hundred signatures at the Aberdeen Centre yesterday…

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Shoot surplus bears and cougars

1996-11-25The Trail Times by David Wilford

To the Editor: … The next enemy we have is a guy called Marr…

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Sights set on saving bears

1996-11-26The Penticton Herald

… Barney Kern… At his own expense, he took time off work and rented a motor home to collect signatures for the Ban Bear Hunting Initiative…

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Bear hunting ban signers should be proud

1996-11-29The Free Press, Prince George, BC by B. Elliott

I was not surprised by the intimidating, dirty behaviour of some wildlife killers during Western Canada Wilderness Committee’s visit… Some wildlife killers and their supporters carried over their violent actions from defenseless animals to non-violent animal supporters, going so far as to tear up a petition sheet with signatures…

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Who cares about bears?

1996-11-30The Vancouver Sun by Ian Graysom

… Marr says while Kenya and India had outlawed lion and tiger hunting respectively, “Canada is still quagmired in the ‘Great White Hunter’ tradition.”…

About Me

Anthony Marr
* has a degree in physics
* is the author of "OMNI-SCIENCE and the Human Destiny" (2003) and "Homo Sapiens SAVE YOUR EARTH" (2008)
* 1995, he cleaned up N. American Chinatowns of endangered species medicines
* 1996, he led "the highest-profile anti-trophy-hunting campaign in Canada" (Globe and Mail).
* 1997-1999, he worked in 3 tiger reserves in India.
* 1999, he founded Heal Our Planet Earth (HOPE).
* 2004/2005, he conducted operations in Japan against whaling and dolphin slaughter.
* 2003-2011, completed 7 Compassion for Animals Road Expeditions (CARE tours, each covering 30-45 states over 4-7 months), and spoke at the National AR Conference every year
* 2009, he founded the Global Anti-Hunting Coalition (GAHC)
* 2010, he won the Henry Spira Grassroots Activist Award.
www.HOPE-CARE.org
www.facebook.com/AnthonyMarr001
www.HomoSapiensSaveYourEarth.blogspot.com
www.AnthonyMarr13.wordpress.com
www.Dying-for Salvation.blogspot.com